Mafia The Game III: Kinder and Gentler

The Game Room
1261

Oops - forgot some names on that list. Assume anyone not mentioned either has a case prepared or I haven’t found anything specific yet.

Basically assume there are 5 people in this game I trust, and they’re dead.
Do I trust myself - not really no. If my judgement was better I wouldn’t have voted percypercy on Day One, and I’d be certain of the detective’s breadcrumb instead of having strong suspicions.

Millit concerning nesta’s post I’ve had a quick look and only one thing does stand out. A possible reason the mafia went for percypercy instead of projammer was that percypercy was refusing to post, while Projammer was a vaguely active participant. The chances of percypercy pulling a blinding defense out of nowhere were much less than that of Projammer defending himself.

Although the other person on three votes at the time was Omi no Kami, which does make me wonder why they didn’t use him as a bandwagon, either.

1262

I’m in the middle of a project here at work, so I don’t really have a lot of time to devote to analysis right now. But if you guys can give me specific questions, I’ll answer them as best I can.

1263

[QUOTE=Gadarene]
Omi No Kami:
I suppose it could be done, although I hate losing people. Is this a formal request?
[/QUOTE]

No, if it’ll be problematic I’ll try to stay in as long as possible.

1264

[QUOTE=tirial]
I will be honest and say this is one of my concerns. I am pretty certain fluiddruid is scum, but the focus on him isn’t necessarily helping to flush out the other scum. Every lead I follow is going back to the same people.

I was looking for data on **nesta, Hal Briston, SnakesCatLady, ** yourself Millit and Omi No Kami, but I can’t make a strong case in either direction at the moment - or at least no stronger than I can for anyone else. To be honest that worries me, as it means any scum in this group are well under the radar.
[/QUOTE]

Anything I can do to help? I’m frankly amazed at how much some of you can post. I’m taking a sick day today but usually can post only once or twice during the day and a little more at night! And our weekends lately have been waiting games. That’s why I made the spreadsheet–whole lot of time on my hands, but couldn’t discuss strategy!

I don’t know that I’m going to base any votes on the list of low-radar players alone. But you’re right about it being an easy place for scum to hide. The only ones I’m really starting to wonder about now are **nesta **and SnakesCatLady. I’m definitely not going to derail what we’ve got going on today (I’m pointing my FOS at fluiddruid and Lightnin’, and still CaerieD for the most part), but SCL does have something fishy in her past:

Day 2:
Kyrie (the Detective) suspects fluid all day.
Later, dnooman and Projammer are tied 6-6.
SCL unvotes Projammer and votes fluid. This is fluid’s only vote at this point.
Kyrie votes fluid, saying “now here’s a bandwagon I can get behind!”
KYRIE TURNS UP DEAD.

It almost looks like SCL was trying to kill a few birds with one stone:

  1. She draws away our suspicion by being “brave enough” to break the tie.
  2. She votes for someone who will likely turn up Mafia long before her, giving her a “safe way” to go on record as having voted for one of her own.
  3. She sets up a fake fight between herself and fluid. (?)

I’m a little unsure about #3. But now that **fluid **is putting pressure on us to vote SCL, is it likely? Do the Mafia care which Mafia we get, if it looks like we’re going to get one anyway? Perhaps fluid is the GF. (Dodgy, but hey, someone has to be the GF.) Is it worth it for fluid to get us to lynch **SCL **if it will get us to put all of our trust in fluid? Mafia “infighting” is a pretty smart tactic, so I guess it’s possible.

I’m still planning on voting for fluiddruid, though.

1265

[QUOTE=Millit the Frail]
I’m a little unsure about #3. But now that **fluid **is putting pressure on us to vote SCL, is it likely? Do the Mafia care which Mafia we get, if it looks like we’re going to get one anyway? Perhaps fluid is the GF. (Dodgy, but hey, someone has to be the GF.) Is it worth it for fluid to get us to lynch **SCL **if it will get us to put all of our trust in fluid? Mafia “infighting” is a pretty smart tactic, so I guess it’s possible./

[Quote]

Heading out shortly, so its a bit difficult to post much now. However is there actually a GF in this game? I don’t remember it from the list of roles.

Also with the Detective dead, the Godfather’s special ability would be less useful, so sacrificing a mafioso who went under the radar to protect him seems unwise.

1266

Nope.

1267

[QUOTE=fluiddruid]
True, by focusing on official vote counts I lose some nuance. Still, the bandwagon for Projammer’s head started on Day One. That’s the point. We’re just churning through the same 5 people and others are under the radar - my ultimate point here.

But, for the sake of argument, let’s say I am Mafia. Wouldn’t it have made more sense to vote Projammer or (assuming he’s town) Omi… or to wait for the tie to be broken?
[/QUOTE]

I agree with you on the continuing focus on just a few people.

However, you misinterpret me. Though I may have voted for you yesterday, I am by no means certain as to your scumminess. It could have been an unfortunate chaining of events that led to percypercy’s demise after all.

And notice, too, that I’m not extending the meaning of day one’s vote turnaround to day three’s vote turnaround: remember that scum can read everything we post and change their tactics accordingly.

Which means that if **Lightnin’**s scum, we may have caught a lucky break on DAY ONE.

1268

[QUOTE=tirial]
Heading out shortly, so its a bit difficult to post much now. However is there actually a GF in this game? I don’t remember it from the list of roles.

Also with the Detective dead, the Godfather’s special ability would be less useful, so sacrificing a mafioso who went under the radar to protect him seems unwise.
[/QUOTE]

OK, no GF. :smack: But how’s this:

Fluid hopes that when she is killed, SCL will fall to the bottom of our lists because she was set up by a Mafia member.

Better? More likely?

1269

I have two lines of thought on this section of fluiddruid’s manifesto.

“…lynching townies to learn something is a bad plan.” - Statements like this are beginning to sound like fingernails on a chalkboard to me in this game. I’m not saying it is a scummy thing to say, per say, but such statements simply have no place in my logic. Some may think I’m nit-picking, but I keep coming back to it, so I think it is worth bringing up.

Only Mafia kill townies. When townies end up lynching another townie, what is truly happening is a sufficient number of individuals make a best-effort vote for a player who’s true role rests in a black box. Even in cases of “suicide” when a townie takes a passive stance instead of trying to derail his/her imminent demise, the votes cast for him/her by town players are not votes toward a townie lynch. They are best-effort votes toward an unknown.

It is only in hindsight after death that statements like “lynching townies” can be made, so it just doesn’t jive with me when such things are said in present or future tense.

fluiddruid has already stated that she will not role-claim to save her neck, but is it really necessary to use such innuendo speak to simply say, “I am town. Don’t kill me. I think that what might be learned from my death by the town is of lesser value than my warm body remaining in the game.”? Assuming she is down, that would be a logical, valid, and honest statement.

Also assuming she is town, “…lynching townies to learn something is a bad plan.” is, imho, much less logical.

To whit, I cannot deny the possibility that she is actually scum, and the statement is part of a muddy water manipulation.

On to topic # 2 : Taking a new approach.

Collectively the town has not made good choices so far, but I am not convinced that we will avoid continuing to make the same collective mistake by hitting the strategic reset button individually. I am not convinced that the same individual town perspectives are responsible for the bad luck we’ve had so far.

1270

Millet the Frail, I unvoted Projammer because he role-claimed. There was nothing brave about it. The role claim didn’t completely remove my suspicions from him but gave me enought doubt that I wanted to wait for more evidence. I voted for fluiddruid because I suspected her and wanted to hear what she had to say. Nothing she has said has changed my mind; I am firmly convinced she is mafia and I am sure I will hang for it if it turns out I am wrong.

How have I “set up a fight” between myself and fluiddruid? I have voted for her for three days running. I was the first to vote for her - hardly likely if I am also mafia. She is (understandably) defending herself, and one of the ways in which she is doing that is to try to deflect attention on to me.

Something that just crossed my mind: we’ve discussed when and if Kyrie investigated anyone and, if so, who. On the first night with not much to go on, it makes as much sense as anything I have heard to assume she just started at the top of the list. On the player list, fluiddruid is the first name. Not wanting to call attention to herself by casting the first vote, she waited until I had done so to vote.

And now I’ll probably get caught up in “methinks the lady doth protest too much”. It’s a very difficult situation to be in when you are accused and have no role to claim other than vanilla townie. If you defend yourself, you’re guilty. If you don’t defend yourself, you’re guilty.

1271

[QUOTE=Millit the Frail]
What do you make of this post by nesta? He claims here that percypercy’s and Lightnin’s bandwagons were really “anyone but Projammer” bandwagons. It was largely this post that led me to vote for Projammer on day 2 and leave Lightnin’ for another day. (I’ll admit that it was kind of a dumb reason, but, well, I never used random.org! :stuck_out_tongue: )

I’m still pretty sure Lightnin’ is scum, but now we have the question as to whether nesta knew about Projammer’s innocence long before the rest of us.

By the way, nesta’s been really under my radar. So has Hal Briston. I keep forgetting they’re in this game. Suspicious? Maybe…
[/QUOTE]

I’ll answer that. In that post I outlined what I thought the three possibilities about Projammer were:

[QUOTE=me]
I see a few possibilities:
a) Projammer is scum, and they were ready to jump on the most likely bandwagon so that he wouldn’t be lynched.
b) Projammer is town, but they were scared that it would lead back to them if they bandwagoned him.
c) Projammer is town, and they just didn’t think his bandwagon was as likely as percypercy’s to go the distance.
[/QUOTE]

This was assuming that the Mafia had a direct hand in the percypercy lynching, and why they chose her and not Projammer. I think that’s still a valid question. I concluded that it was option a, that Projammer was scum, but I was obviously wrong. I now think it was a combination of b/c. Of course, I’m not convinced at this point that they really instigated the percypercy bandwagon in the first place.

Sorry I’ve been so quiet today. For the first three days I wasn’t afraid to pick my best suspect and try to convince others I was right. I was wrong about Projammer, and wasted a lot of valuable time building theories based on his scumminess. That’s all out the window now, and I’m not sure I trust my gut until I have a chance to go back through everything with this new information. I started doing that last night, but it’s taking longer than I thought to review the thread.

My gut right now is that fluiddruid is scum, but her recent defense was compelling, and I agree that we need to take a step back from the usual suspects and look at those flying under the radar. And yes, that includes myself. I admit my pushing for Projammer’s lynch is a huge mark against me. I decided early on that I would pick my best suspicion and run with it. That’s great when you’re right, but really sucks when you’re wrong. Now I’m forced to question my own judgment. This is making it hard to point many fingers. I will do so, though, before the day is over.

1272

Huh.
I’m looking over fluidruids entire defense post. The whole history of voting (seeing it all in one place like that for the first time) really makes me wonder now. I’m seeing things I never saw before.

1273

[QUOTE=nesta]
I’ll answer that. In that post I outlined what I thought the three possibilities about Projammer were:
This was assuming that the Mafia had a direct hand in the percypercy lynching, and why they chose her and not Projammer. I think that’s still a valid question. I concluded that it was option a, that Projammer was scum, but I was obviously wrong. I now think it was a combination of b/c. Of course, I’m not convinced at this point that they really instigated the percypercy bandwagon in the first place.

(snip)

[/QUOTE]

Again: Projammer was not in (big) danger to be lynched when the bandwagon against percypercy formed. Lightnin’ was .

1274

Well, we’ll know a bit more when/if Lightning and Fluiddruid end up dead. If both are town, then we’ll have learned that every “contest” so far was a choice between lynching two townies. Which means we’ve been truly lead around by the nose. However, although I’ve got a very low suspicion of Lightning, Fluiddruid is still pretty high on my list. I agree that we’ve done a poor job of focussing supicion on low-visibility players.

1275

[QUOTE=SnakesCatLady]
Millet the Frail,

<snip>

And now I’ll probably get caught up in “methinks the lady doth protest too much”. It’s a very difficult situation to be in when you are accused and have no role to claim other than vanilla townie. If you defend yourself, you’re guilty. If you don’t defend yourself, you’re guilty.
[/QUOTE]

Two I’s, not an I and an E! No, it’s cool. I’m trying to branch out from the Usual Suspects, because we’re really up crap creek if we’re wrong about them.

And I agree, the whole back-and-forth thing makes this game really hard. If you’re a vanilla townie, once you’ve explained yourself, all you can do is either protest a lot or just sit there and take it. And if you’re a power role, you have to worry about whether you should go for a role claim and risk being recruited or killed by the Mafia. (Or, in Projammer’s case, risk no one believing you anyway!)

Maybe each of us townies should take a suspicious under-the-radar (UTR ™) person, not alert them about it, and follow their every move over the next day or two. Pick me if you want! I don’t know how great this idea is, but I think I’m going to give it a try. It’s a really terrible idea to start a bandwagon against a UTR right now, when there are other fish to fry, but we will need a few cases against them (us?) over the next few days, because our Mafia suspect pool has been drying up.

Again, I’m not sure how well this will work, because I’ve been trying to play very transparently so far. But it’s not really working. Before I gather enough evidence to really get someone, I let them know I’m watching, and then my theory is shot to hell because they’re being extra careful. Good job so far, nesta and SCL, at defending yourselves and deflating me pretty quickly. My next FOS victim gets the silent treatment and a free pass to slip up all day today…so I can hit pay dirt for tomorrow.

1276

[QUOTE=DiggitCamara]
Again: Projammer was not in (big) danger to be lynched when the bandwagon against percypercy formed. Lightnin’ was .
[/QUOTE]

Well, I agree to a point. Projammer wasn’t in big danger, but at the time, assuming he was scum (see post 443 for my original suspicion) it made sense for other scum to see him in enough danger to take action. At post 477 Projammer, Lightnin’, and Omi No Kami were all tied with 3 votes, and were arguably in equal danger. Then Lightnin’ got another couple of votes (from Millit the Frail and SnakesCatLady), putting him at 5. At that point he was definitely in a lot more danger than Projammer. Then votes started falling off Lightnin’, and percypercy started getting votes.

My original argument, which I now know was wrong, was that the Lightnin’s bandwagon was a failed attempt to divert attention from Projammer. When some people expressed distrust of the Lightnin’ bandwagon, they switched over to percypercy instead.

Looking back at my notes about the Day 1 vote swing, I can see how it might have been a Mafia orchestrated percypercy lynch to protect Lightnin’. If Lightnin’ is scum that makes Lemur866 suspicious for post 486 where he says:

[QUOTE=Lemur866]
Crap. This Lightning bandwagon is wrongheaded. Sure he seemed to get upset when people targeted him, but…but…I’m convinced a scum would try to play it cooler. It rings false to me as the action of a Mafiosi.

But in order to head off the Lightning lynch, we’ve got to pick someone else, and that means bandwagoning on one of the people who have three votes already, compared to Lightning’s five. And honestly, I don’t feel any strong difference between Projammer and Omi No Kami and Lightning.
[/QUOTE]

And also tirial in post 485 where she says:

[QUOTE=tirial]
Actually after a few moments reflection I will say I’m not comfortable with the Lighnin’ bandwagon (and apologise for mangling your username in the post above).

If I said the quote issue is just too obvious, and the bandwagon seems to have gained a lot of votes very quickly. We don’t really have anything to compare his reaction to, to see whether its innocent townie or frantic scum. Has anyone else been under a similar bandwagon in this game for comparison?
[/QUOTE]

These two posts seem to be a large part of why the Lightnin’ bandwagon fell apart. The problem I have about this is that tirial has seemed more town than not to me. Maybe I’m wrong, though.

1277

[QUOTE=nesta]

These two posts seem to be a large part of why the Lightnin’ bandwagon fell apart. The problem I have about this is that tirial has seemed more town than not to me. Maybe I’m wrong, though.
[/QUOTE]

You mention some interesting data points that would/should be examined when/if Lightnin’ is lynched and if he’s scum.

There are several other interesting posts that several parties made that day, but all hinges on that important question: Is **Lightnin’ ** scum?

1278

I still have my eye on CarieD, but she’s been very quietly lately…

I’ve also been thinking about how jagged and bitter the pill would be if, after 2 days when the votes were tied between two town candidates that result in two town hangings, we balk at an apparent tie between two scum, but then spin off into some new strategic territory because we’re gunshy.

I fear that we may be on the threshold of doing just that.

1279

[QUOTE=nesta]
[snip]

And also tirial in post 485 where she says:
These two posts seem to be a large part of why the Lightnin’ bandwagon fell apart. The problem I have about this is that tirial has seemed more town than not to me. Maybe I’m wrong, though.
[/QUOTE]

We have to keep in mind that town can be swayed to defend Mafia, though. I’m not convinced of the case against Lightnin’, but the fact that someone who’s been acting very trustworthy helped stop the bandwagon against him doesn’t necessarily make him town. There might have been a concerted Mafia effort to save him or it could have been unfortunate choices by townies.

1280

[QUOTE=Lemur866]
Well, we’ll know a bit more when/if Lightning and Fluiddruid end up dead. If both are town, then we’ll have learned that every “contest” so far was a choice between lynching two townies. Which means we’ve been truly lead around by the nose. However, although I’ve got a very low suspicion of Lightning, Fluiddruid is still pretty high on my list. I agree that we’ve done a poor job of focussing supicion on low-visibility players.
[/QUOTE]

I don’t think the Mafia would kill them if they are town since they’ve both garnered so much suspicion, so the only way they are going to die is if we lynch them. If we lynch Lightnin’ and fluiddruid and they’re both town, we’re pretty much screwed. If the scenarios I outlined in post 1203 are correct, there’s a chance that we could lose right there, and if not, we would probably lose if we lynched one more townie. This is why we need to start piecing things together today, rather than wait until one or both are lynched.